Arrival (ARVL) pivots business strategy again, moving Van production to US-based microfactory
EV start-up Arrival has announced its second business strategy pivot in the past three months. After recently demonstrating the successful use of its microfactory model in the UK to build its all-electric van, Arrival has decided to refocus its business approach and all resources for the US market with hopes of maximizing federal tax credits.
Arrival ($ARVL) is an EV start-up focused on delivering urban-centric mobility, which originally consisted of larger plans that included an all-electric passenger bus, a delivery van, and a rideshare-specific Arrival Car designed alongside Uber.
The company currently has headquarters in both London and Charlotte, North Carolina, but up until now, all of its R&D and design has taken place in Bicester, where Arrival Van production was originally scheduled to begin following the recent proof of concept build of the Van using the microfactory model.
Rather than pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into the construction of mega production facilities, Arrival’s model takes existing industrial facilities and installs its own assembly cells, removing the need for any special foundations, pits for painting, or other assembly processes.
Since going public via SPAC merger in March of 2021, the start-up’s stock has stumbled, leading to an announcement this past July that it would be reorganizing its business to focus on Arrival Van production. As a result, Arrival put a complete halt to Arrival Bus and Car development for the time being.
Most recently, Arrival has decided to pivot its EV business once again, this time shifting its focus to US production due to the significant cost to scale overseas and a less-than-stellar at-the-market (ATM) platform.
Arrival moves Van production to US but will still operate in UK
Arrival shared details of its latest change to its strategy to hopefully (finally) scale EV production toward viability – a difficult hurdle that has sunk many start-ups that have come before it. According to the company, it plans to shift the focus of its Van products and coinciding EV technologies (core components, composite materials, mobile robotics, and software-defined factories) for the US market. Per the release:
In August, the Company announced plans to use existing cash on hand of $513M plus funds available through a $300M At the Market (ATM) Platform to deliver the first vehicles to UK customers this year, invest in hard tooling and launch the Charlotte microfactory next year. At the end of Q3, the Company had existing funds of approximately $330M cash on hand and due to the current share price and daily trading volumes, has not found the ATM to be a reliable source of capital. Scaling production in the Bicester microfactory requires significant further investment in hard tooling and working capital and the Company has determined that the benefits of such an investment would be best directed to the US market.
Arrival shared that a major reason for its decision to focus on its US business was the revised terms of the federal tax credit as part of the recently signed Inflation Reduction Act. These terms allow for federal credits between $7,500 to $40,000 for commercial vehicles. The company also cited the large addressable market size of the US and substantially better margins as other factors in its decision.
In order to keep the lights on at Arrival HQ, it intends to pare down its workforce yet again in order to match its business restructuring while simultaneously cutting cash-intensive activities. Arrival candidly shared that these proposals are expected to have “a sizable impact on the company’s global workforce, predominantly in the UK.”
Despite impending layoffs overseas, Arrival says it will still produce a small number of Vans in Bicester in order to optimize its microfactory processes and support trials with UK customers. Looking ahead, the EV start-up says it intends to raise additional capital requires to fund the commercialization of US Van production. It is currently “exploring all funding and strategic opportunities.”
Good luck, y’all.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Subscribe to Electrek on YouTube for exclusive videos and subscribe to the podcast.
Paris’ bike-share system, Vélib has long been considered one of the shining success stories of urban micromobility. With a massive fleet of over 20,000 pedal and electric-assist bicycles around Paris, the service has helped millions of residents and tourists get around the City of Light without needing a car or scooter. But lately, a growing problem is threatening to knock the wheels off this urban mobility marvel: theft and joyriding.
According to city officials and the service operator, more than 600 Vélib bikes are now going missing every single week. That’s over 30 bikes a day simply vanishing from the system – some stolen outright, others taken on “joy rides” and never returned.
“At the moment we’re missing 3,000 bikes,” explained Sylvain Raifaud, head of the Agemob company that currently operates the Velib system. That’s nearly 15% of over 20,000 Vélib bikes across Paris.
The sticky-fingered culprits aren’t necessarily professional thieves or organized crime rings. Instead, they’re often regular users who treat the shared bikes like disposable toys.
The city estimates that many people have figured out how to pry the bikes out of the system’s parking docks, unlocking one for a casual cruise and then ditching it somewhere far from a docking station.
Once pried free, the bikes are technically usable for the next 24 hours until their automatic locking feature kicks in. At that point, the bikes are often simply abandoned. Some end up in alleyways. Others get tossed in rivers. A few just disappear completely.
And since the bikes are intended to be parked at their many docking stations around the city, they don’t have GPS chips, further complicating recovery of “liberated” bikes.
The issue started small but has grown into more than an inconvenience – it’s beginning to undermine the entire purpose of the service. With bikes going missing at such a high rate, many Vélib docking stations are left empty, especially during rush hours.
Riders looking for a quick commute or a convenient hop across town are increasingly finding themselves without available bikes, or having to walk long distances to find a functioning one.
That kind of unreliability chips away at user confidence and threatens to drive potential riders back into cars, cabs, or other less sustainable forms of transport at a time when Paris has already made great strides to dramatically reduce car usage in the city.
The losses are financially painful, too. Replacing stolen or vandalized bikes isn’t cheap, and the resources spent on tracking down missing equipment or reinforcing anti-theft measures are stretching thin. Vélib has faced theft and vandalism issues before, especially during its early years, but this latest surge has officials sounding the alarm with renewed urgency.
Officials acknowledge that there’s no easy fix. Paris, like many cities with bike-share systems, walks a fine line between accessibility and accountability. Part of what makes Vélib so successful is its ease of use and widespread availability. But those same features make it vulnerable to misuse – especially when enforcement is limited and the consequences for abuse are minimal.
The timing of the problem is especially unfortunate. In recent years, Paris has seen impressive results in reducing car traffic, expanding bike lanes, and promoting cycling as a key part of its sustainable transport strategy. Vélib is a cornerstone of that plan. But if the system becomes too unreliable, it risks losing the very people it was designed to serve.
Meanwhile, as Parisians increasingly find themselves staring at empty docks, the challenge for the city and Vélib will be to restore confidence in the system without making it harder to use. That means striking the right balance between freedom and responsibility, between open access and protection against abuse.
In a city where cycling is supposed to be the future of mobility, losing thousands of bikes to joyriders and sticky fingers isn’t just frustrating; it’s unsustainable.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike